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Ron Paul Institute Blames Nairobi Mall Massacre on U.S. Foreign Policy

Drone program in Somalia singled out as reason for the attack

September 30, 2013

U.S. interventionist foreign policy is to blame for the deadly mall massacre in Nairobi, according to the Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity. The institute’s executive director Daniel McAdams called the terrorist attack "retaliation for years of murderous foreign interventionism" in an article posted to RPI’s website last Wednesday:

By proxy, by drone, and directly, the United States has been at war with Somalia for many years. Armed groups in Somalia, especially the al-Shabaab, clash almost daily with the Kenyan military in Kenya's US-supported ongoing military operations inside Somalia.

Suddenly the terrorist act at the Westgate Mall, though no less reprehensible, takes on a new light. It was not an attack out of the blue because the attackers hate the freedoms of Nairobi shoppers. An evil act in retaliation for years of murderous foreign interventionism. Blowback.

Al-Shabaab, a terrorist group affiliated with al Qaeda, has claimed responsibility for the attack. McAdams writes that the U.S. "pushed" Kenya to intervene in Somalia in 2011, leading al Shabaab to retaliate:

Back to Africa. Fast forward to 2011, when the al-Shabaab was weakened by internal rifts and low popularity and finally driven out of Mogadishu altogether.

Then came more outside intervention. The US and France, primarily, pushed Kenya to attack neighboring Somalia in late 2011, providing air and naval support for the operation. US AC-130 gunships provided cover for the invading Kenyan military fighters. US Special Operations forces were deeply involved. US drones continued their near-constant attacks on Somalia, leaving "collateral damage" in their wake and terrorizing the population. The al-Shabaab movement vowed revenge for this attack and not long after bombed a nightclub in Nairobi.

Kenya intervened to help stabilize Somalia in 2011, after Kenyan tourist spots were hit with a string of kidnappings and attacks by Somali criminals who crossed over the border. Since the early 1990s, Kenya has suffered security problems on the border it shares with the failed state.

Ron Paul is a proponent of the "blowback" theory, which holds that interventionist foreign policy is to blame for terrorist attacks and other atrocities committed by bad actors around the world. Paul has said the Sept. 11 attacks were caused by blowback.